Port St. Joe, FL

Port St. Joe: The Town That Wrote Florida’s Soul—Then Vanished

Welcome to Drive Thru Towns. In this episode, we explore the "Forgotten Coast" to uncover the story of a city that was once the largest and most ambitious in Florida—only to be wiped off the map in less than a decade.

Port St. Joe (formerly St. Joseph) isn't just a quiet waterfront town; it is the birthplace of Florida’s legal identity. We look at the rise, fall, and resurrection of a city that refused to stay buried:

• The Rivalry of the Century: How a group of defiant businessmen built St. Joseph from scratch just to spite the neighboring town of Apalachicola.

• The Constitutional Convention: The incredible story of how the legal soul of Florida was written in 1838 in a grand hall that no longer exists.

• The Triple Crown of Disaster: A harrowing look at how yellow fever, a devastating fire, and a massive storm surge erased a city of 12,000 residents in a matter of years.

• The Great Migration: How the few surviving houses were literally floated on barges across the bay to start over in other cities.

• Modern Resilience: A visit to the Port St. Joe of today—a place of pristine scallops, working waterfronts, and a museum where mannequins tell the story of a vanished empire.

  Port St. Joe reminds us that while cities can be erased by the elements, the ideas and laws they leave behind can govern for centuries.

Host: Andrew Wilcox

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Special thanks to Chloe Jones for the music: chloejonesmusic.co.uk